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IMPORTANT: What will be our new focus?

Arnox

Master
Staff member
Founder
Messages
5,285
People were talking about how Sanctuary needs to specialize in something. I'm really starting to agree with this. I don't think we can work off of just being a general forum. Even if it's a very nice forum. So what would you guys like Sanctuary to focus on? Oh, three points to remember though before you post anything!

1. There are some things that will not change at all in the transition. Most notably, Sanctuary rules will NOT be changed with the new focus. And I hope I'll never ever have to change them. A reputation system will also not be added now or ever. Sanctuary will be upgrading, not sidegrading.

2. Before you guys automatically say "gaming", PLEASE keep in mind that gaming websites are everywhere. Our usual focus on freedom to say what you want gives us a serious edge over our other competitors such as the Escapist, but we may need to offer more than that! So yeah, you can still suggest it of course, but be aware of what we're going up against.

3. Our chosen specialization will be fully finalized once we transfer over to XenForo. (At that point, we'll be Sanctuary 3.0.) The site will get a full face lift naturally and we'll soon have so much raw functionality, I'll have to take some months to get completely familiar with it all. XenForo is damn powerful.
 

Houseman

Zealot
Sanctuary legend
Messages
1,068
How general or specific could this new "focus" be? Would something like "diversity, discussion, debate" be more or less general than "gaming"? Or perhaps I'm looking at it wrong, and the former would be like a "branding", and the latter would be a "focus", and you could have both.
 

Arnox

Master
Staff member
Founder
Messages
5,285
andersonnnunes said:
There are some 20 XenForo sites that I often "visit" (my feed reader does it for me), some of them are on the same niche. For gaming, there are two. If I have to add a 3th, or a 4th or a 5th, I will add them, it is no problem at all.
What would you like to see though personally?

Houseman said:
How general or specific could this new "focus" be? Would something like "diversity, discussion, debate" be more or less general than "gaming"? Or perhaps I'm looking at it wrong, and the former would be like a "branding", and the latter would be a "focus", and you could have both.
Can be as general or as specific as we like, but we WILL have to focus on it though above all else. Well, besides the raw freedom that we offer of course. And yeah, make sure not to confuse branding with the focus. Though our branding should reflect our focus of course.
 

Vendor-Lazarus

Arch Disciple
Sanctuary legend
Messages
937
I would be fine with remaining a general forum, but I can understand wanting to focus on specifics to draw in new blood.
As long as we keep freedom of speech and freedom of information in our foremost thoughts.
Perhaps enshrined in the rules and through the logo/name in case a takeover in attempted.
If Article 11 & 13 come to pass, have you given any thought to moving host-location, away from Europe?

As have been said on several occasions, Gaming (though a good choice) forums are everywhere.
They seem to mostly devolve into Triple-A and Console talks though.
I personally don't play many such games at all, and tend to avoid those.
Steam did cause quite a few gaming sites to close, so even there the number isn't quite as high as it used to be.
Niche gaming genres, like 4X, Construction and Management Simulators, Space Trading and Combat Simulators and various Rogue-like and Survival, could perhaps attract the indie crowd. Especially some of those don't yet exist on Steam.
I don't know if simply being able to talk about them is enough.. Doing reviews, lets plays, wiki's, servers or something more could be required as well.

Then we have the Writing scene. I know for a fact that HFY on reddit have undergone several changes, always caused by a change in reddits tos. Some went to Voat, others started their own sites. I don't know the potential of XenForo for posting long stories though. It would also require a legalese rule/tos to have the authors keep their work while still be able to publish it without incurring legal trouble through someone suing.
 

Vendor-Lazarus

Arch Disciple
Sanctuary legend
Messages
937
Despite the idea only being half-formed, I'm going to put it into text while I can.

I don't think there exists a site wherein a game is described with actual descriptions of important in-game properties like camera, pace, etc


Forget that, too much work really..Although I would love to at least have the all-important camera aspect described.
Since I want to avoid Over-the-Shoulder cams and cockpit cams personally.

How about "tagging" game titles with a list of negative anti-consumer practices, like quick-time events, engine tied to framerate, ingame stores, micro-transactions, gamepad support/controls, etc?

Well, now that this mess of a post is out there, feel free to object, or add, or ..whatever.
 

bluegate

Disciple
Sanctuary legend
Messages
292
How in the hell are quick time events "anti-consumer", what are you on about?

Or engines being tied to frame rates for that matter; it may be archaic engine design but it's not anti-consumer, especially if the game plain just works.
 

Signa

Libertarian Contrarian
Sanctuary legend
Messages
764
Even though there are plenty of gaming sites around, most have had progressive infiltration into them. We will stand out by being about gaming AND freedom.
 

Guilion

♪El mariachi fennec quiere bailar♪
Messages
57
Ok, so here are some suggestions that I thought of on my way home:
  • First of all I don't think keeping the Carnality forum is a good idea and may only invite troublemakers in the future, I would replace it with a section to talk about explicit materials (Books, movie, games, etc) and leave out stuff like drugs and guns.
  • Second, while I 100% agree on keeping the same rules, I (Oh my god I'll get so grilled for this) think along with the migration it's time for a name change as whenever you look the forum on any search engine you gets results like this. Whether this is the result of sanctuary being such a common word or search engines explicitly avoiding listing the site due to the site's previous association with &totse is beyond me.
  • Finally freedom of speech is too mudded and filtered by search engines, I was originally going to propose changing the site's mantra to freedom of expression but it seems like that one suffers from the same effect too, therefore I propose changing the site to something along the lines of "Free sharing of ideas and information" or "Participation with minimal intervention" or "Diversity of though and exchange" or something to that effect; maybe even invoke protection of civil rights if you're feeling adventurous.
Anyways, those are just some ideas.
 

Vendor-Lazarus

Arch Disciple
Sanctuary legend
Messages
937
I really don't think naming this forum with any kind of "Diversity" tag would end well. It has become too corrupted a word. It would attract those that want to limit freedom of speech and push away those we want.

The problem with having a focus is that it will narrow down our pool of possible posters, even within those who've already joined. I still think keeping it general and with Freedom of Speech and Information is the way to go.
We just have to be patient.
 

Houseman

Zealot
Sanctuary legend
Messages
1,068
Vendor-Lazarus said:
The problem with having a focus is that it will narrow down our pool of possible posters, even within those who've already joined. I still think keeping it general and with Freedom of Speech and Information is the way to go.
We just have to be patient.
I agree with this. I don't think we really need a focus. Giraffe board doesn't have one, and they're doing fine, though I'm sure there's a deep lore and history that I'm not privy to.

Regarding the first part about "diversity of opinion" being tainted, that's not so in my experience. In fact, SJWs have explicitly said that "...of opinion" is the WRONG kind of diversity:

http://www.yainterrobang.com/diversity-of-opinion/
http://archive.is/kmnfX

So I think we're safe there.
The only danger is people X'ing out as soon as they see "Diversity..." without reading the other two words "...of opinion"
 

infinityshock

Disciple
Messages
331
People were talking about how Sanctuary needs to specialize in something. I'm really starting to agree with this. I don't think we can work off of just being a general forum. Even if it's a very nice forum. So what would you guys like Sanctuary to focus on? Oh, three points to remember though before you post anything!

1. There are some things that will not change at all in the transition. Most notably, Sanctuary rules will NOT be changed with the new focus. And I hope I'll never ever have to change them. A reputation system will also not be added now or ever. Sanctuary will be upgrading, not sidegrading.

2. Before you guys automatically say "gaming", PLEASE keep in mind that gaming websites are everywhere. Our usual focus on freedom to say what you want gives us a serious edge over our other competitors such as the Escapist, but we may need to offer more than that! So yeah, you can still suggest it of course, but be aware of what we're going up against.

3. Our chosen specialization will be fully finalized once we transfer over to XenForo. (At that point, we'll be Sanctuary 3.0.) The site will get a full face lift naturally and we'll soon have so much raw functionality, I'll have to take some months to get completely familiar with it all. XenForo is damn powerful.
the first thing you need to do is change the banner and remove 'freedom of speech <penis> freedom of information'...because those are the last tenets this site espouses. your whingy self with your fragile ego cant tolerate the slightest affront to your authori-tay.

something more accurate would be 'arnies cesspool'...'dragon fetish B us'...'do exactly what i says or i banzorize youz'...or something like that.

most importantly you need to stop trying so hard. if you werent a retarded shitadmin youd realize these sites are community driven and its the community that determines what is discussed and what the topics are. let the natural flow happen and stop being such a tryhard.
 

Arnox

Master
Staff member
Founder
Messages
5,285
most importantly you need to stop trying so hard. if you werent a retarded shitadmin youd realize these sites are community driven and its the community that determines what is discussed and what the topics are. let the natural flow happen and stop being such a tryhard.
That's what it was supposed to be, but we don't really offer anything a bunch of other forums don't, content wise. So no one really joins.
 

infinityshock

Disciple
Messages
331
That's what it was supposed to be, but we don't really offer anything a bunch of other forums don't, content wise. So no one really joins.
no one joins because you act like a bitch and you ban people or harass them because you have a fragile ego...and i wasnt referring to myself.
 

Arnox

Master
Staff member
Founder
Messages
5,285
no one joins because you act like a bitch and you ban people or harass them because you have a fragile ego...and i wasnt referring to myself.
You know what, I think you're the only one I've actually had to ban ever since I started Sanctuary up again. lol
 
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